


safe keeping

by withoutwords



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Angry Sex, Angst, Broken Up, M/M, No happy endings, handjobs
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 11:21:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12107643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/withoutwords/pseuds/withoutwords
Summary: Aaron’s shockingly gorgeous in dark denim and shirt – he looks like he shouldn’t be alone, should be savoured and worshipped and had.





	safe keeping

**Author's Note:**

> hey guys! this is just a random piece I wrote tonight, wanting to get robron out of my system a little. it's set in some dubious, recent timeline, but doesn't mention the specifics of their break up at all. so imagine whatever you like. thanks so much for reading <3

Robert keeps a box of Aaron’s things stored away. Bits and pieces that got caught up in Robert’s (stuff he’s too cowardly to return and too lonely to part with). An old watch that stopped working at three forty-two and that Aaron refused to chuck. A t-shirt he pretended to like to spare Vic’s feelings, but only ever wore under a thick jumper. A comb, cologne, a Glam Metal CD Liv bought to take the piss and that Aaron secretly loved listening to when it was just him and Robert.

A wedding ring.

Robert’s no stranger to sadness. Which sounds dumb, he knows it, and pathetic, which shows, but – it isn’t like mourning a death. It isn’t like staring into the empty cavern of his life wondering what he’s supposed to do now. He knows that already, he had that. Family, love, purpose.

He was full up. _He still is_. There’s no space for anything else.

“Jesus, Robert,” Aaron snaps when Robert finds him outside the Woolie. He’s sprawled along a seat, legs all spread, his head tipped back and his cheeks flushed as though he’s been drinking. 

Robert almost laughs at himself. As if he hasn’t been drinking.

“What? I was just walking past,” Robert says, but he’s stopped. He puts his hands in the pockets of his jeans, afraid of what they might try to do. What they would have done, once upon a time. “Is that a crime now?”

“It should be.” 

Robert doesn’t pretend not to look. Aaron’s shockingly gorgeous in dark denim and shirt – he looks like he shouldn’t be alone, should be savoured and worshipped and _had_.

“Are you going into town?” Robert asks, all the possibilities turning sour in his gut.  Where’s Aaron going, who is he seeing, what does he plan to do now that he can?

(Shit. _Does he want to?_ )

Aaron shakes his head. “Unbelievable,” he mutters bitterly. “You’ve no right to check up on me, Robert.”

“I’m not! I swear.”

“Then do one, yeah?”

“Alright.” Robert throws up his hands. “Have a good night.”

Aaron huffs at him. “Sure.”

“Seriously. You look,” Robert gives him a once over before catching himself. When he meets Aaron’s eyes, Aaron’s staring right back, and Christ, Robert misses it. He misses so many things. “You should have fun. You deserve it.”

It was starting to get cold, now, and dark enough that most of the village had disappeared for the night. Robert might as well be walking in circles; he had no place he wanted to be except where he just came from. And if life’s taught him anything it’s that he can’t go back.

“Why,” is all Robert hears from behind him, before Aaron swings him around and throws him against the brick. It’s fierce and it’s huffing, like a hundred times before; Aaron’s anger and his lust and the endless battle between the two, the _fight, fight, fight_.

“Aaron,” Robert starts to say, before Aaron smashes their mouths together, a knuckle punch that makes him taste blood. They kiss like that for a long moment, nasty and biting and fingernails clawing (Robert’ll probably have marks there tomorrow).

“Why do you do this to me,” Aaron’s saying, pulling at Robert’s belt, Robert kiss-drunk and confused and still trying to catch up. “Why do I want you so much?”

They kiss again, and Robert likes to pretend that it’s warmer. That it slows down and clings tight and never lets go. That it means more than letting off steam, or falling into bad habits, or having something simple in this mess of confusion and pain.

Robert’s pants pop open and he jerks back.

“Just, just stop.” Aaron does, dragging in breath, his jaw at a tense angle and his eyes dark with loss. Robert’s knuckles are white where his hands are fisted in Aaron’s shirt. He gives him a gentle shake. “Explain this to me.”

“What’s to explain?”

“Can we go ho – to the Mill?”

“ _No_ ,” Aaron says, firm. “No, just – here. Now. Yes or no?”

“Yes,” Robert tells him, before he even stops to think about it. “Always yes, but - ”

“Then kiss me.”

Robert does. He leans back and pulls him in and he misses this – Aaron’s face in his hands, Aaron’s taste in his mouth, Aaron’s hand cool and shocking as it pumps at his dick, pulling and twisting in all the right ways. He misses it all, but that feels too simple. He misses youth, and summer, and Andy. Not having Aaron is something on its own.

Not having Aaron is everything.

“Shit, shit,” Aaron pants into Robert’s open mouth, his hand wrapped around both of them now and working tight and fast. Robert just grabs at him, bows for him, just takes what he can get. It’s dirty and it’s wanting and it’s not who they were for a long time – but they’ve always had each other in whatever way they could.

They were always the only two things that made sense.

“Yeah, yes,” Robert says in shocked little bursts, feeling it all right there at the edge, the heat, the tangle, the thread. He’s hyper aware of every part of Aaron still touching him. The scrape of his beard and the dry of his lips and the calluses on his fingers he’d almost forgotten.

He’s begging, and muddled, “Fuck, please, _please_ ,” and coming all over both of them, feeling the jolt of Aaron doing the same. 

It’s slow motion for a moment. Aaron’s head dropping gently to Robert’s shoulder, Robert’s hand soft at the back of his neck. He can feel Aaron breathing, and the warmth of his skin, and how he’s still wound up, even now. Because he’s here, he’s with Robert. And it’s not enough.

“You alright?”

“No,” Aaron says, so softly, before pulling away. He doesn’t meet Robert’s eyes. “No. _Fuck_.” 

Robert doesn’t try to stop him from stalking away – he’s taken more than he deserves tonight. He just stands there, still hanging out, still slowly crumbling into something he doesn’t recognise. A thing. Like the ones he keeps in a box. Broken, unwanted, ashamed.

He just wishes he could hide himself away, too.

Until Aaron comes back to claim them.

**Author's Note:**

> [tumblr.](http://thefancyspin.tumblr.com)


End file.
